UPDATE/CLARIFICATION: Legislative leaders and budget officers say that for fiscal 2017 that ended in June, they estimate the Legislature has about $1.6 million it budgeted for legislative operations that it did not spend, and that the Legislature did reduce its spending for the year.

Lawmakers said they plan to apply this surplus toward the Legislature's fiscal 2018 budget, which is set about 13 percent below fiscal 2017.

Budget officers said their best estimate is that fiscal 2017's legislative spending when accounting is finalized will be about $27,157,693, not the $28,767,693 previously estimated. This would be a nearly 6 percent cut in Legislative spending.

The chart in the original story has been updated to show these figures, along with comments from House Speaker Philip Gunn.

ORIGINAL STORY:

As lawmakers begin scrutinizing state agencies' spending plans, one budget gets little attention — usually not even a mention: the Legislature's.

Lawmakers over the last couple of years drastically cut most state agencies' spending, but not their own. Many agencies have had large layoffs, but legislative staffing has remained relatively stable or increased in some cases.

According to the Legislative Budget Office, legislative spending by fiscal year has tracked:

2010: $24,581,087

2011: $23,456,568

2012: $24,877,688

2013: $26,422,483

2014: $26,444,511

2015: $26,560,684

2016: $28,222,368

2017: $28,767,693 *Legislative leaders and budget officers say they estimate the Legislature did not spend about $1.6 million of this amount for the fiscal year that ended in June, dropping its spending to $27,157,693.

The Legislature's own spending has increased at least every year but one since fiscal 2013, the first budget set by the current legislative leadership. For fiscal 2017, lawmakers budgeted themselves more money, but budget leaders say there is $1.6 million unspent in the legislative budget that will be applied to fiscal 2018.

"We have cut back," said House Speaker Philip Gunn. "For 2018, we cut our budget $3 million — more than that if you count the re-appropriation ($1.6 million)."

For fiscal years 2016 and 2017, revenue shortfalls forced the governor to make six rounds of emergency mid-year cuts that hit most other agencies and lawmakers cut most budgets year-over-year — for total cuts in double digits for many agencies. But lawmakers increased their own spending in '16 and budget for '17.

For fiscal 2018, which began July 1, lawmakers — at least on paper — have vowed to cut legislative spending to about $25 million, or by 13 percent. But in past years, lawmakers have added money to the legislative budget, so such frugality remains to be proved.

Early this year during the last legislative session, some legislative leaders were angered when a report showed that state agencies gave thousands of pay raises amid drastic budget cuts, revenue shortfalls and layoffs.

Lt. Gov. Tate Reeves at the time said: "Many of the agencies on this (raise) list are the first to complain when budgets are reduced. It is disingenuous for these agency leaders to say they are underfunded when they make spending decisions that cost taxpayers more money."

But records released by the state auditor's office this week show most of Reeves' 48 Senate staffers received pay raises for the same budget year. The auditor's report shows 37 Senate staffers, nearly all those working full time, received pay raises in the 5-percent range compared to the fiscal 2016 report. For instance, Reeves' director of legislative affairs' annual pay in the auditor's report increased from about $96,500 to $101,400.

The House in recent years has given some large raises to staffers, but did not appear to have across the board raises from 2016-2017.

Reeves on Thursday said, "We've made some significant reductions in expenditures on the legislative side" for the current budget year and "you're going to see us finding other savings as well."

"I know in the Senate we've cut all ou-of-state travel for state senators, and we haven't filled a number of positions," Reeves said. "Our deputy secretary of the Senate has retired, and we have not filled that position and we've had a retirement in our legal team and we have not filled that as well."

According to state auditor's records, House and Senate staffing (full and part time) and salary spending per fiscal year was:

2016:

House: 71 staffers, $2,759,831 in salaries

Senate: 51 staffers, $2,629,753 in salaries

2017:

House: 72 staffers, $2,853,585 in salaries

Senate: 48 staffers, $2,631,986 in salaries

Both Reeves and House Speaker Philip Gunn have vowed to continue being budget hawks as lawmakers begin the process of setting a budget for next fiscal year.

Gunn recently said: "We Republicans have campaigned for many, many years that we are for living within our means, we are for controlling spending, we are for reducing the size of government. We don't have a revenue problem. We have a spending problem. We are for reducing the tax burden."

Reeves at the start of the Joint Legislative Budget Committee hearings on Thursday vowed the committee would "work for taxpayers and not the bureaucracy that has been created over the last 200 years."